Global Warming and Climate Justice

Global Warming – a cascading crisis that is profoundly unjust

On May 15, 2016 the congregation voted to take a stand on global warming. Over 90% of the members in attendance voted for our congregation to stand behind this statement.

As members of Edmonds Unitarian Universalist Congregation, our mission statement calls us to live our vision of a just and sustainable world. The contradiction at the heart of our economic system — requiring continuous growth on a finite planet — is incompatible with a sustainable human presence on the Earth. The most devastating consequence of continuous growth is global warming. This creates cascading crises that are profoundly unjust, as they visit the bulk of their devastation on those least responsible for them. This is a moral crisis when:

corporations devise business plans that damage or destroy the lives of defenseless and blameless beings.

When our immediate comfort and economic security is put ahead of the suffering and survival of some of the poorest and most vulnerable on Earth, that’s moral wrongdoing on a cosmic scale and we respond with moral outrage.

Our compassion calls us with deeply felt urgency to take immediate action to:

resist the forces that are unravelling the interconnected web of life;

stop the harm and undo the damage that we’ve done;

begin the radical transformation to a low carbon economy that addresses poverty, invests in disadvantaged communities, and promotes social, economic, racial, and clean air, water and food justice.

Thus we embrace and accept our moral responsibility to learn, educate, and take leadership in creating a radical revolution of values to make real our vision for a thriving planet.